Catholic Comment News

The Papal Transition - a busy time for Catholic Comment

February and March 2013 were exciting months for the Catholic Church world wide, beginning with the unexpected resignation of Pope Benedict on February 11th - an event unprecedented in modern times - through the transition period and coming to terms with a 'Pope Emeritus' and finishing with the equally unexpected election of Pope Francis on 13th March.

It was an exciting - and busy - time too for Catholic Comment, with speakers featuring in the 29 media interviews throwing light on the procedures and their significance for Catholics and for the world. Maura Garrihy and Catholic Comment chaplain, Fr Rob McCabe, spoke live from Rome as events unfolded, and Kevin Leahy was in the RTE studios, taking part in a Drivetime discussion on possible papabile - those considered likely candidates - when the white smoke emerged from the Sistine Chapel and shortly afterwards, Pope Francis was introduced to the world.

In the hours after Pope Benedict resigned, Kathleen Pacious was on RTE main evening news bulletins and on Newstalk Lunchtime, and Petra Conroy and Lórcán Price were contributors to the Prime Time special that evening. In the weeks that followed Paddy Scully explained the procedures surrounding the election of a new pope on stations in Cork, Tipperary, Mayo, Carlow and others while Robbie Butler took part in a panel discussion on Newstalk. Catriona Curran and Maura Garrihy - back from her Roman travels - chatted on TV3 programmes about what the papacy of Pope Francis promised.

A historic time for the Church and our team were honoured to be part of it all and to contribute to better understanding of what was happening as event unfolded.

Links to some of the interviews are below and you can find others on our interviews page